President Park Geun-hye will visit the National Assembly Speaker Chung Sye-kyun to seek the legislature’s cooperation in solving the current political deadlock, Cheong Wa Dae said Tuesday.
But an encounter with party leaders remains unlikely as opposition parties are gesturing refusal, claiming that the president should first withdraw her disputed appointment of Prime Minister nominee Kim Byong-joon.
“The president will visit the speaker‘s office at 10:30 a.m. in response to such calls from the parliament,” presidential spokesperson Jung Youn-kuk told reporters.
“The purpose of the visit is to seek the parliament’s cooperation in solving the current circumstances.”
His remarks followed a Facebook posting by Rep. Park Jie-won, floor leader and interim chief of the runner-up opposition People’s Party.
“According to notice from the Speaker‘s office, the president is coming to visit the assembly at 10:30 a.m. today. I am not going,” he wrote earlier in the morning.
The Blue House claimed that it is still communicating with the opposition camp, especially on having their leadership attend the meeting at the Speaker‘s office.
Whether or not to withdraw the nomination of the prime minister may also come up during the meeting, the presidential officel also explained.
The state leaders’s surprise visit to the legislature came a day after the new presidential chief of staff, Han Gwang-ok, had met with opposition leaders to seek their cooperation.
The presidential office has recently been under fire, not only for the extensive corruption scandal involving key presidential aides such as Choi Soon-sil, but also for Park‘s consecutive personnel decisions. The prime ministerial appointment was largely accused by the opposition as a unilateral decision which fails to reflect the public sentiment.
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